1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a method and system for associating keywords with objects in a video file so that the keywords are searchable on the internet by existing search engines.
2. Description of the Related Art
It is desirable to be able to locate videos that a user wants to watch based on a key word search. It is also desirable to search for video clips that contain certain objects in the clip. Methods of searching for videos in a large database or on the internet using keywords are well known in the art.
U.S. Pat. No. 6,925,474 to McGrath discloses a system of searching a database for videos containing certain objects and attempting to isolate only the portions of the videos that contain that object. The method uses the audio track to search, e.g., by searching the closed caption text or by first converting the audio track to text using a voice recognition program, e.g., akin to DRAGON NATURALLY SPEAKING® or the like. McGrath does not track objects. McGrath also does not attach hyperlinks to objects within the video. Moreover, McGrath is searching existing words in the video, not keywords for objects. Further, the audio track text will not necessarily correspond to the portion of the video showing a desired object. The object may only be mentioned once, and not necessarily at a beginning and ending frame containing the object. In fact, the object may not even be mentioned at all in the audio text.
There have also been patents on tracking objects throughout video clips and hyperlinking them to more information about that object such as U.S. Pat. No. 6,642,940 to Dakss. However, no search method for such an object is disclosed. A complete system that enables an intranet or internet user to link to the object by keyword searching is needed.